The Impact and MLS did all they could do; surgery was conducted on the Impact’s domestic schedule so they would have weekends off leading up to and during the CCL final. They had bye weekends, while Club America had no such advantages. While the Impact spent the weekend prepping for the second leg of the final, Club America had a Sunday match against its fiercest rival, Chivas. That gave the Mexican side little time to get to Montreal and get used to the turf.

So, on a Tuesday night packed with action for the Canadian soccer supporter — what was the most important moment? Was it a last-gasp goal from Cameron Porter, or a second-half marker from Kosovar Sadiki?

In 2009, the Montreal Impact gave up two stoppage-time goals to Santos Laguna, and fell at the CONCACAF Champions League’s quarter-final stage. In 2015, the Impact is set to meet Pachuca in the quarter-finals — and the Canadian side is carefully preparating for its Mexican opponent. Can the Impact exorcise the demons of 2009?

The Impact will now play in Los Angeles on Oct. 16.

But, for the third time since Canada began sending a team to the CCL, our representative has been knocked out of the competition thanks to a loss in Torreon. Montreal gave up two injury-time goals to lose there back in ’09, then TFC twice in 2012.

"There's no way that was a 3-1 game," said TFC head coach Paul Mariner. "I thought we were a little tentative in the first half and in the second half we played much better… We matched them for 89 minutes."

With just 5,324 fans in attendance at BMO Field and no TV broadcaster airing the game, Toronto FC's performance in its CONCACAF Champions League opener against CD Aguila could well become an urban legend.

At halftime, TFC defied critics by being tied 2-2 with a team that hasn’t lost at home this season. But, by the 64-minute mark of the game, it was all but over.

“Coming off in the tunnel in here those were the words that were said and other words too that I don’t want to repeat but it’s going to be a tough one,” said Johnson, talking specifically of the warnings of war.

Toronto FC has very little margin for error. For a team that's struggling to both consistently defend and, increasingly, struggling to score goals, one mistake is all it takes to waste a strong performance. Such was the case on Saturday, when TFC largely outplayed the Columbus Crew but came up on the wrong end of a 1-0 result at BMO Field.